Petronas Towers (redirected from Petronas Twin Towers)

Petronas Towers, twin skyscrapers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, that are the world's tallest twin towers. Standing 1,483 ft (452 m) high, they were designed by the Argentinean-American architect Cesar Pelli. Completed in 1997, they surpassed Chicago's Sears Tower as the record-holding tallest structure; they themselves were surpassed by Taipei 101 in 2003. The twin towers house Petronas, Malaysia's government-owned oil company, as well as associated Malaysian firms and multinational companies. Part of a large burst of construction that marked the country's 1990s economic boom, the buildings stand at the northern end of a projected high-tech business zone, the Malaysia Multimedia Supercorridor. Built of steel-reinforced concrete columns clad in stainless steel and glass, with a design based on geometric patterns originating in ancient Islam, the 88-story buildings are connected at levels 41 and 42 by a double-decker pedestrian skybridge, and each tower is surmounted by a 242-ft-high (74-m) pinnacle. At the lower level, the Petronas Towers also include a concert hall that is home to the Malaysian Philharmonic and a business reference library.

Bibliography

See C. Pelli and M. J. Crosbie, Petronas Towers (2001); M. Thomas, The Petronas Twin Towers (2001).

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Petronas Towers

Twin stainless-steel-clad skyscrapers, linked by a skybridge, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Designed by Cesar Pelli (b. 1926) and completed in 1998, the circular, step-tapered towers house the headquarters of Malaysia's national petroleum company. Each tower is 88 stories high, has a structural frame of high-strength, steel-reinforced concrete, and reaches a height of 1,483 ft (451.9 m)—a figure that includes a pinnacle and steel spire atop each. In 1996, after achieving their full height, the towers were considered the world's tallest buildings, surpassing the then-tallest Sears Tower; they, in turn, were superseded in 2003 by the Taipei 101 (Taipei Financial Center) building in Taipei, Taiwan, that rose to 1,667 ft (508 m).